Heather Hedden teaches in-person taxonomy workshops at conferences once or twice per year. Following is a description of the next conference workshop.
Taxonomy Design Best Practice for Knowledge Graphs
Organizer: Connected Data London
Date: Wednesday, December 11, 2024
Location: Convent, 133 Houndsditch, London, UK
Ontologies form the semantic framework for linking data within knowledge graphs, but users often start their queries with subjects, which they may describe inconsistently. This is where a taxonomy is useful: bringing together synonyms and other variant names and arranging concepts in user-friendly browsable hierarchies or facets. A taxonomy, whether considered part of an ontology or connected to an ontology, is thus an important part of a knowledge graph. Furthermore, taxonomy concepts are designed and implemented to be tagged to content, thus extending the scope of a knowledge graph to include not just data but also varied relevant content (documents, media, etc.)
While taxonomies are easier to design and create than ontologies, too often they are created without any skill or training. In other cases, taxonomies originally designed for a different purpose are inappropriately reused. Poorly designed or inappropriate taxonomies yield poor results.
This tutorial will cover the basics and best practices in taxonomy design, including standards, sources for topical concepts, wording of labels, alternative labels, hierarchical and associative relationships, and governance. How taxonomists connect to ontologies will also be discussed.
Outline:
- Introduction to taxonomies and other types of controlled vocabularies
- Standards and models for taxonomies
- Sources for taxonomy concepts
- Wording of concept labels and alternative labels
- Taxonomy hierarchical and associative relationships
- AI and LLMs in taxonomy development
- Taxonomy and ontology comparisons and connections
- Tools for managing combined taxonomies-ontologies
In this workshop attendees will:
- Recognize where and when taxonomies are needed.
- Know what resources to use in developing or editing a taxonomy.
- Know the basics of creating good taxonomies or modifying existing taxonomies to enhance their knowledge graphs.
Description on the conference website
Registration and costs
Register here for options of:
£50 for the single masterclass remote online with recording
£300 for the full day of 4 consecutive masterclasses remote online with recordings to all 20 masterclasses
£600 for the full day of 4 masterclasses in-person
£600 for the full 3-day conference remote online
£1,800 for the full 3-day conference
If space is available, the option to register for this single masterclass in-person at £150 will be made available closer to the conference date.
(Prices above include tax.)
Connecting Users to Content with Taxonomies
An Introduction to Taxonomy Design and Creation
Organizer: The Information Architecture Conference (IAC)
Date: Tuesday, April 29, 2025, 9:00 am – 5:00 pm EDT
Location: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Taxonomies have evolved from classification systems to adaptable interactive tools to link users to desired content on websites, intranets, and web applications. Taxonomies are not the same as a website’s navigation and can do a lot more through facet filters, term suggestions, and multiple hierarchies. To be truly helpful, however, taxonomies need to be well designed to suit the users and use cases, be customized to the content, and conform to taxonomy best practices and standards so that they are easy and intuitive to use.
This workshop teaches taxonomy creation principles with a focus on serving users. It presents best practices in designing taxonomies, including the principles of wording of terms, sources for terms, incorporating synonyms, creating relationships between terms, and designing hierarchies and facets. Other topics include taxonomy project planning, sources for terms, and taxonomy testing. Exercises and software demos will also be included.
Specific Lessons and Takeaways:
• How taxonomies can enhance search and findability
• What sources to use for developing taxonomy terms and the recommended process
• How to create terms, their synonyms, and relationships, according to best practices
• How to design hierarchies and facets
• How to govern and maintain a taxonomy
Why Should I Sign Up?
Taxonomy design is an important part of information architecture, in helping users get access to content. Many information architects create taxonomies without any training. While general IA methods are applicable to some of taxonomy design, there are other issues that require a deeper understanding of taxonomy principles and best practices.
Description on the conference website
Registration and Cost
Registration for the full-day 7.5-hour workshop is $650.
Registration on the conference website opens in early 2025.